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President Donald Trump directed his longtime attorney Michael Cohen to lie to Congress about negotiations to build a Trump Tower in Moscow, according to two federal law enforcement officials involved in an investigation of the matter. Trump also supported a plan, set up by Cohen, to visit Russia during the presidential campaign, in order to personally meet President Vladimir Putin and jump-start the tower negotiations. “Make it happen,” the sources said Trump told Cohen. And even as Trump told the public he had no business deals with Russia, the sources said Trump and his children, Ivanka and Donald Trump Jr.,...

The 35-page document of unverified allegations about President-elect Donald Trump's links to Russia and compromising information the Russian government might have on him that BuzzFeed published on Tuesday is actually fairly old. Snip Both Sen. Harry Reid and Sen. John McCain knew about the dossier over a month ago. Both thought it was serious enough to warrant an FBI investigation.

A Treasury Department employee has been charged with leaking confidential banking reports of suspects charged in special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation. Federal prosecutors say Natalie Mayflower Sours Edwards is set to appear in court Wednesday in Virginia. The 40-year-old Edwards is a senior official at the department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network. She’s accused of leaking the material to a journalist — who’s not named in court papers. Prosecutors say reports on Paul Manafort, Richard Gates and Maria Butina were among those leaked. …

A U.S. Treasury Department official has been criminally charged with leaking confidential documents relating to former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort, the Russian embassy and others, to a reporter from digital media company BuzzFeed, Manhattan federal prosecutors announced on Wednesday. Natalie May Edwards, a senior adviser in the Treasury Department's Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), was arrested on Tuesday and charged with unauthorized disclosure of suspicious activity reports, according to the office of U.S. Attorney Geoffrey Berman. She was expected to make an initial appearance in Virginia federal court later in the day.

...she is a whistleblower who sent suspicious activity reports to BuzzFeed News after trying in vain to work through lawful channels. Her actions became the basis for the global FinCEN Files investigation. They also described her disclosures as “unparalleled in FinCEN’s history,” having sent approximately 50,000 documents, including 2,000 SARs, to Leopold over the course of a year and running searches within internal systems at his request.

A former top Treasury Department official pleaded guilty Monday to conspiracy for leaking confidential banking reports associated with members of the Trump campaign, following her dramatic arrest in October 2018 as she toted a flash drive full of sensitive documents. Natalie Edwards, 41, entered the plea in Manhattan federal court, where U.S. District Judge Gregory H. Woods set sentencing for June 9. Although the conspiracy charge carried a potential penalty of up to five years in prison, Edwards signed a plea deal with prosecutors that recommended a potential prison sentence of zero to six months.(Prosecuters are probably Democrats too) Edwards...

The former US Treasury Department staffer accused of leaking confidential information to a reporter pleaded guilty Monday to a single count of conspiracy. Natalie Mayflower Sours Edwards admitted before Manhattan federal court Judge Gregory Woods to spilling secrets to a Buzzfeed reporter about the Mueller investigation and probes into Paul Manafort, Rick Gates and Russian agent Maria Butina. The 41-year-old’s plea comes as she was approaching trial on charges including conspiracy to make unauthorized disclosures between October 2017 and October 2018 while working for the treasury department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network. Prosecutors accused the Virginia woman, who was arrested in...

The top Treasury Department employee who was arrested and charged by federal authorities with leaking confidential financial documents pertaining to former Trump officials was apprehended with a flash drive containing the allegedly pilfered information in her hand, prosecutors said Wednesday. The dramatic arrest came on the heels of other high-profile, leak-related prosecutions under the Trump administration, which has pledged to go on the offensive against leakers that the president has called "traitors and cowards." Natalie Mayflower Sours Edwards, 40, a senior official at the department's Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), is accused of illegally giving a reporter bank reports documenting...